As coronavirus cases rise and fall, companies continue to grapple with the return to work: Should we ask workers to come to the office? Should we go remote forever? If we do hybrid, what does that look like?
Why it matters: Finding the answers to all of those questions is a windfall for consultants.
- The return-to-office dilemma is the best thing to happen to consultants since Y2K, Bloomberg's Matthew Boyle reports.
All of the big consulting firms — like McKinsey, BCG, EY, Deloitte and more — have gotten into the remote work consulting game.
- These "transformation services" the firms offer can cost anywhere from $5 million to $10 million per project, writes Boyle.
- So with companies in every industry and of every size lining up to get answers, solving the return-to-work conundrum is turning into a lucrative business.
What to watch: Yes, consultants are offering their advice on hybrid work, but no one really knows what's coming or what work will look like when the pandemic is finally behind us.
- Brad Bell, director of the Center for Advanced Human Resource Studies at Cornell told Boyle, "I've studied remote work for two decades, but what we experienced over the last year and a half is nothing like what we studied."
